[Review: Odd & True by Cat Winters]

"Odd & True"
Author: Cat Winters
Series: None
Pages: 368
Genre: YA, Historical Fiction, Paranormal
Date Published: September 12th, 2017
Publisher: Amulet Books
Format Read: eARC provided by the publisher (via NetGalley) for honest review

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Summary:

Trudchen grew up hearing Odette’s stories of their monster-slaying mother and a magician’s curse. But now that Tru’s older, she’s starting to wonder if her older sister’s tales were just comforting lies, especially because there’s nothing fantastic about her own life—permanently disabled and in constant pain from childhood polio.

In 1909, after a two-year absence, Od reappears with a suitcase supposedly full of weapons and a promise to rescue Tru from the monsters on their way to attack her. But it’s Od who seems haunted by something. And when the sisters’ search for their mother leads them to a face-off with the Leeds Devil, a nightmarish beast that’s wreaking havoc in the Mid-Atlantic states, Tru discovers the peculiar possibility that she and her sister—despite their dark pasts and ordinary appearances—might, indeed, have magic after all.

-Goodreads

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My Thoughts:

Cat Winters has done it again, blending reality and the paranormal, while making you wonder what's real and what's not. If you're familiar with Winters' work, "Odd & True" will feel both familiar and new. While the novel has all the staples of a Winters' novel, it also feels a lot darker, and like more of a fairytale than any of her previous YA novels. 

"Odd & True" is the story of two sisters and the stories that they tell themselves. As the narrative unfolds the walls between what is real and what is made up start to break down. This is a historical novel that's deeply rooted in heartache and darkness, and yet there is still a lightness, and a love that fills the pages. 

It's a historical fairytale in a way. Odd tells True about their life and weaves a story of mothers who are monster hunters, and castles on hills, but it's what she's hiding behind these pretty stories that makes this book so interesting. Odd's a haunted character, and the way she deals with confronting her demons is to be commended! She's such a great character.

And then we have True. True who has grown up feeling like her family isn't a mess, thanks to Odd. But she's got her own things to deal with, including a disability she got from having polio as a child. Winters' takes True from a shy character to one that's just as strong and just as interesting as her older sister, and it's great fun to watch her grow as the story unfolds. 

The story comes to a head when the sisters take off to hunt down their mother, and the great Leeds Devil. Do they really come from a family of monster hunters? Is the Leeds Devil real? Will they make it out alive? And what secrets are each of the girls hiding? You're just going to have to read "Odd & True" to find out.

  5 Unicorns = Get Your Hands On This NOW!

[Review: The Steep & Thorny Way by Cat Winters]

"The Steep & Thorny Way"
Author: Cat Winters
Series: None
Pages: 352
Genre: YA, Historical Fiction, Paranormal
Date Published: March 8th, 2016
Publisher: Amulet Books
Format Read: ARC provided by publisher for honest review

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Summary:

A thrilling reimagining of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, The Steep and Thorny Way tells the story of a murder most foul and the mighty power of love and acceptance in a state gone terribly rotten.

1920s Oregon is not a welcoming place for Hanalee Denney, the daughter of a white woman and an African-American man. She has almost no rights by law, and the Ku Klux Klan breeds fear and hatred in even Hanalee’s oldest friendships. Plus, her father, Hank Denney, died a year ago, hit by a drunk-driving teenager. Now her father’s killer is out of jail and back in town, and he claims that Hanalee’s father wasn’t killed by the accident at all but, instead, was poisoned by the doctor who looked after him—who happens to be Hanalee’s new stepfather.

The only way for Hanalee to get the answers she needs is to ask Hank himself, a “haint” wandering the roads at night.

-Goodreads

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My Thoughts:

Cat Winters has done it again. She's mixed historical horrors with paranormal horrors, and still managed to make the historical ones chill my blood more than the supernatural ones. As soon as I heard that she was writing a reimagining of Hamlet set in 1920's Oregon, I knew this was going to be one of my most anticipated reads of 2016, and boy oh boy, I wasn't wrong in assuming it would be quick favorite. 

Though Hanalee is Winters' main protagonist, she doesn't shy away from adding a secondary lead in the form of Joe. Not only were both of these characters amazing on their own, but when you put them together, actual magic happens. They're the most unlikely SHIP ever, but even with main plot points being in the way, I still found myself SHIPING them, and then I found myself satisfied with how Winters wrapped those two kids together. They're a dynamic duo, and one that I'm glad I got to "meet".

The historical detail that Winters goes into is something to praise. She doesn't shy away from the hard stuff. She puts her characters through the ringer to make sure that history isn't forgotten. I found myself being shocked by facts about the KKK that I wasn't privy to before I read this novel. The Klan's prejudice wasn't directed at one people group, but a large collection. Jews, homosexuals, and Catholics were also persecuted in the name of their cause, and I applaud Winters for making sure that she added these facts into her story. It's terrifying, but it's a part of our history that shouldn't be forgotten. 

Winters also adds in bootlegging, ghosts, and so many twists and turns that you don't know where to look. This might be Hanalee and Joe's story, but it's also a story about the human soul, and it proves that no matter what gets thrown at us, there is always a way to uncover the truth. There is always a time to find true friendship. And there is always a place to finally call home.

Wanna know more? I interviewed Cat over at Bystander Mag, and she has a lot of interesting things to say!

Rating:

     5 Unicorns = Get your hands on this one NOW!

[Review: The Uninvited by Cat Winters]

"The Uninvited"
Author: Cat Winters
Series: None
Pages: 368
Genre: Adult, Historical, Paranormal, Romance
Date Published: August 11th, 2015
Publisher: William Morrow
Format Read: eARC provided by publisher (via Edelweiss) for honest review

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Summary:

From the award-winning author of In the Shadow of Blackbirds comes a stunning new novel—a masterfully crafted story of love, loss, and second chances. Set during the fear and panic of the Great Influenza of 1918, The Uninvited is part gothic ghost-story, part psychological thriller, perfect for those who loved The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield or The Vanishing by Wendy Webb.

Twenty-five year old Ivy Rowan rises from her bed after being struck by the flu, only to discover the world has been torn apart in just a few short days.

But Ivy’s life-long gift—or curse—remains. For she sees the uninvited ones—ghosts of loved ones who appear to her, unasked, unwelcomed, for they always herald impending death. On that October evening in 1918 she sees the spirit of her grandmother, rocking in her mother’s chair. An hour later, she learns her younger brother and father have killed a young German out of retaliation for the death of Ivy’s older brother Billy in the Great War.

Horrified, she leaves home, to discover the flu has caused utter panic and the rules governing society have broken down. Ivy is drawn into this new world of jazz, passion, and freedom, where people live for the day, because they could be stricken by nightfall. But as her ‘uninvited guests’ begin to appear to her more often, she knows her life will be torn apart once more, but Ivy has no inkling of the other-worldly revelations about to unfold.

-Goodreads

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My Thoughts:

An Open Letter To The Uninvited, 

You are a book that is made out of my favorite kinds of nightmares, all mashed together. You're dark, haunting, and beautifully written. The imagery in you is equal to the wonderful characters that also fill your pages. No one is perfect, and nothing is as it seems in your pages, and that is just how I like things to be. I honestly couldn't have asked for more from you, so thanks for delivering on such a delightfully high level.

-The White Unicorn

It's well known that I am a Cat Winters fan girl. If she writes it, I'll read it. No questions asked. So when I heard that she was releasing her first Adult Novel, I got really excited. And let me tell you, The Uninvited did not disappoint. It has all the elements that I have come to love in her YA books, and then had the added fact that her protagonist was actually closer to my age. It made the reading experience really exciting for me. 

Winters is a master of mixing the paranormal, spiritualism, a history together. It's a mixture that works wonderfully for her, as her writing is beautiful and gothic. She has a way of making things feel as though everything she writes is real, and it pulls you right into the story, and makes you question everything!

The Uninvited is a tad on the slow side, but it did nothing but make the novel feel more authentic to me. Plus there is a lot of action, and plenty of time to get to know Winters' well formed characters. The plot is a tad more on the adult side, but I felt like a younger audience would enjoy it as well. 

I really adored Ivy. I thought that it was an interesting choice to make the main character a recluse, who decides to grab at her freedom after her family commits such an awful crime. It was also interesting to see how German immigrates were treated during the war. It was something that I had never thought about, but Winters makes it one of her main plot points, and the pay off was that it made me think.

I wish I could say more about the book in detail, but it truly is one of those novels that you just have to read for yourself. Too much talk of everything would ruin the experience of reading it, and so I will keep my mouth shut. Trust me, you'll thank me later. All I will say is that you need to read this one. You won't be sorry. And when you're done, we can talk about it. 

Rating:

  5 Unicorns = Get your hands on this NOW!  

[Interview and Giveaway: The Cure for Dreaming by Cat Winters]

It's no surprise that I adored The Cure for Dreaming to pieces, and that there is no other book that I would rather promote on Halloween this year. Lucky for us, Cat Winter's agreed to do an interview and her answers will make you want to pick this book up ASAP.

Throw in the fact that I gave the book a 5 unicorn review (which you can read HERE) and you know it's a good one. In fact, I haven't seen a review lower than 4 stars anywhere, so far.

If you like vampires and classic horror novels and women's rights and dreamy hypnotists, then this is the book for you, because it has all of that. It also has awesome quotes and vintage pictures that add a special touch when needed.

So, let's get on with the interview, shall we?!

Question 1: What made you choose Dracula as the classic monster story you incorporated into The Cure for Dreaming?
 

Cat's Answer: During the major TWILIGHT craze, an idea popped into my head: Wouldn't it be fun to one day write a story about teens reacting to the publication of DRACULA when it was a brand-new novel? I tucked that idea into the files of my mind. When I started writing THE CURE FOR DREAMING, I originally set the book in the early 1880s and used older vampire novels as the source of Olivia's hypnosis visions. However, I've always been drawn more to the latter part of the Victorian era, so I realized I would enjoy writing the book more if I set the book in 1900. DRACULA was first published in the U.S. in 1899, so my protagonist, Olivia, turned into a major fan of Stoker's novel--a novel that follows her into her hypnotized state.

Question 2:  Adding magic and hypnotism into the plot made things really interesting. Did you ever think that you'd use a different profession for Henri, or was he always a hypnotist?

Cat's Answer: The book originally started with the idea of writing about a Victorian hypnotist, so that was always his profession. Three years ago I felt inspired to write something theatrical and Victorian, with a touch of Gothic horror. Erin Morgensern's THE NIGHT CIRCUS, a novel about fictional Victorian magicians, was a major new release at a time, so I didn't necessarily want to write about a magician. My mind instead veered to the idea of a stage hypnotist, and eighteen-year-old hypnotist extraordinaire Henri Reverie was born. 

Question 3: What made you want to write a novel about woman's rights in Portland?

Cat's Answer: I've been interested in the women's suffrage movement ever since I saw the HBO movie IRON JAWED ANGELS, which chronicles the struggles of real-life U.S. historical figures such as Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, who were active suffragists during the years leading up to the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. These women underwent arrests, hunger strikes, and force-feedings, all so women of the future--women like myself--would be given the right to vote. Their fight for equality deeply moved me.

I set the book in Portland, both because I live here and because the fight for suffrage in the state was such a frustrating one.  A measure giving women the right to vote appeared on ballots in 1884, 1900, 1906, 1908, and 1910, but it didn't pass until 1911. That's a long and bumpy road to equality. I chose 1900 for the setting of THE CURE FOR DREAMING specifically because it was one of the years that saw the failure of the referendum.

Question 4:  Olivia sees the world as it is and yet magical realism is a huge tool in the plot, can you explain why you choose to add that into the mix?

Cat's Answer: I wanted the hypnosis to have a little twist to it. It would be extremely depressing to read about a man who wants to remove the rebellion out of his daughter's head . . . and to have the hypnosis actually work the way he wants. Henri tells Olivia she will see the world the way it truly is and that the roles of men and women will be clearer than they have ever been before. The results dip into magic realism: Olivia often sees glimpses of people's true natures, and sometimes even settings change before her eyes. My editor suggested that Olivia doesn't always see people and places for the way they truly are, and I agreed. It's more unsettling to suddenly become knocked off balance with a supernatural vision. I won't reveal why Henri gives Olivia this "gift" of seeing the true nature of things and whether it's more harmful or helpful, but I will say I thoroughly enjoyed venturing into the realm of a realistic fantasy. You'll see more of that technique in some of my future works.

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Giveaway:

One lucky person will be able to win an ACR copy of The Cure for Dreaming, so enter below!

 (the giveaway runs until November 5th and is limited to US residents only, because of monetary reasons)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

[Review: The Cure for Dreaming by Cat Winters]

"The Cure for Dreaming"
Author: Cat Winters
Series: None
Pages: 368
Genre: YA, Historical Fiction, Paranormal
Date Published: October 14th, 2014
Publisher: Amulet Books
Format Read: Hardcover provided by publisher for honest review

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Summary:

Olivia Mead is a headstrong, independent girl—a suffragist—in an age that prefers its girls to be docile. It’s 1900 in Oregon, and Olivia’s father, concerned that she’s headed for trouble, convinces a stage mesmerist to try to hypnotize the rebellion out of her. But the hypnotist, an intriguing young man named Henri Reverie, gives her a terrible gift instead: she’s able to see people’s true natures, manifesting as visions of darkness and goodness, while also unable to speak her true thoughts out loud. These supernatural challenges only make Olivia more determined to speak her mind, and so she’s drawn into a dangerous relationship with the hypnotist and his mysterious motives, all while secretly fighting for the rights of women. Winters breathes new life into history once again with an atmospheric, vividly real story, including archival photos and art from the period throughout.

-Goodreads

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My Thoughts:

An Open Letter To The Cure For Dreaming,

I'm just going to say, I love you. You're the best kind of Historical Fiction. The kind that blends reality and fiction together in a way that seems seamless. You terrified me with some brutal metal pictures, of both the paranormal kind and the reality of what women used to and still can go through. You tell a story of woman's rights in a way that makes me really pay attention. I also love that your drenched in Dracula lore, it gives the story an extra punch. You're the best.

-The White Unicorn

Do you love Historical Fiction? Do you love vampire lore? Do you dig woman's rights? Do you like magic? If you answered yes to all or any of these questions, then The Cure for Dreaming is the book for you. Seriously, go read it right now.

It's no secret that I fell in love with Cat Winter's first book, In the Shadow of Blackbirds and that I was awaiting her Sophomore novel while twiddling my thumbs in anticipation. The wait was worth it and Winter's has provided us with yet another atmospheric, haunting and surprising novel. She has a way with words that makes you feel everything that her characters feel. Instead of feeling like a bystander, you fell like you're a fly on the wall, living in the world that's been printed in words on the page. There was a dream that Olivia has that almost made me gag and not many books make me feel the emotions of the characters in such a tangible way.

Let's talk about Olivia. She's a firecracker and a fighter and a girl who refuses to accept the world as it is. She believes that women are smart and independent and that they should have a voice. Her mother ran off on her and her father years ago and Olivia sees that she's an independent woman. Her father, on the other hand thinks that women should be silent and do only what they are told by the men of the household. Winter's writes about the suffragette movement and the treatment of women in such a way that you feel for Olivia and every girl in this book. Once Olivia is able to see what the world is really like, her world becomes even more terrifying that it first was. I loved that no matter how scary things got for her that she never gave up and she never backed down. Girls like her, even though she's fictional, are the reason that we as women get to live life the way we do and I love that Winter's chose to write about this topic and that she chose Olivia to helm her book.

The added story arc of hypnotism and magic is a wonderful one. It keeps things interesting, while still driving the point home. This book is about woman's rights, but it's also about relationships and learning who you are and who you can be. Henri is a huge part of Olivia's journey. He's alluring, but he's not always the hero. I liked this about him. His reasons are good ones, but when he hypnotizes Olivia, you can't help but feel a little off put by him. I couldn't get a clear read on him in the first half of the book and I found myself doubting him as the book went along, but  I couldn't help being a fan as well. 

The romance between the two is there, but it's light. I'm glad that it exists, but I also love what direction Winter's takes it in. She never let's Olivia fall into depending souly on a male, which makes the main point of this novel hit home even more. Sure you'll swoon, but I think we can all agree that everything works out how it's supposed to. (If you haven't read this book, I'm sorry that I'm not sorry that I'm being vague. Guess you'll just have to read it for yourself to know what I'm talking about)

Winter's also heavily weaves literature into her story. Which fits her Oregon setting. Olivia is obsessed with Dracula and writing and all of this comes into play. It all has it's place in the story, because nothing that Olivia's father does to her to keep her docile works out the way he has planned.

Seriously, just stop whatever you're doing and read this book. It's important and on top of that it's brilliant and what more could you want from a novel?

Rating:

     5 Unicorns = Get your hands on this NOW!

[Waiting On Wednesday: The Cure For Dreaming]

Waiting On Wednesday happens every week on Wednesdays (hence the name) and is hosted by Breaking The Spine.  It's were people talk about the books they want to read about that aren't out yet.

My pick this week is...

"The Cure for Dreaming"
Author: Cat Winters
Release Date: October 14th, 2014

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Summary:

Olivia Mead is a headstrong, independent girl—a suffragist—in an age that prefers its girls to be docile. It’s 1900 in Oregon, and Olivia’s father, concerned that she’s headed for trouble, convinces a stage mesmerist to try to hypnotize the rebellion out of her. But the hypnotist, an intriguing young man named Henri Reverie, gives her a terrible gift instead: she’s able to see people’s true natures, manifesting as visions of darkness and goodness, while also unable to speak her true thoughts out loud. These supernatural challenges only make Olivia more determined to speak her mind, and so she’s drawn into a dangerous relationship with the hypnotist and his mysterious motives, all while secretly fighting for the rights of women. Winters breathes new life into history once again with an atmospheric, vividly real story, including archival photos and art from the period throughout.

 -Goodreads

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I want this book in my hands yesterday! I became a HUGE fan of Winters after I read In the Shadow of Blackbirds (which I still think is my favorite book of last year). If you haven't read it, do it now. And then read this one with me when it comes out!

What are you waiting on this week?  I wanna know!    

[It's My Birthday, So We're Partying With My Favorite Book Of The Year]

Guys, did you hear that?  

 

Yes, it could have been early fireworks, lit by people who just can't wait till July 4th, but I'm sure that they were for me.  Cause... wait for it...

 

Today is my birthday! (but I already told you that in the title of this post...)

 

 I'm a quarter of a century old today, so that's kinda weird.  I remember when I thought 25 was old, but here I am, and it doesn't seem so old now.  (Okay, it still kinda does)  But it doesn't matter, because I LOVE birthdays!  So much!  They are some of the coolest things out there, in my opinion! 

 

But enough about me already.  Since none of you will be able to attend my party tonight I figured that I'd throw one on here, one that we can all get excited about and I even invited a special guest!  Cause we all know that parties are cooler when you have a special guest, right?  I can't tell you how much I've come to love book blogging.  This little blog started in February and it just keeps bringing the coolest books and people into my life!  So thanks for rocking so much!  Oh yeah, back to the special guest!

Introducing: Cat Winters (author of In the Shadow of Blackbirds and my favorite read of 2013... so far)

(CM) First thank you Cat for stopping by on my birthday!  It's great to have you here!  So let's start this off.  In the Shadow of Blackbirds is set during World War I, what made you pick that War as part of your setting?

(Cat) First of all, happy birthday! Thank you so much for inviting me to be here to help you celebrate.

I picked World War I because I was extremely fascinated by the history of Spiritualism in the United States. The U.S. Civil War and WWI were two moments in time when séances and spirit photography flourished due to widespread grief. I'm more interested in early-twentieth-century history than the 1860s, so I opted to portray the resurgence of Spiritualism in 1918.

(CM) I didn't really know much about The Spanish Flu, but it plays a large role in your book, what made you want to add that element of doom into the mix?

(Cat) When I dug into 1918 history, the flu emerged as a major factor in people's lives...and it added another explanation for the séance and spirit photography craze of the era. When the average life expectancy suddenly drops to the age of 39 in a year, it makes sense that people would have been desperate for comfort. The more I wrote, the more the flu became almost a character in the novel, breathing down my protagonist's neck. When I read personal accounts of 1918, I noticed people were frustrated that this killer flu sprang up right when they were already worrying about the war, so I wanted to portray the disease as a bully that came out of nowhere and made an already bad situation so much worse.

(CM) Spiritualism also has a huge role in In the Shadow of Blackbirds.  What was your favorite part about researching spirit photographers and the like?

(Cat) Researching Spiritualism was both entertaining and heartbreaking. During the WWI era, fraudulent spirit mediums and photographers who claimed to capture the images of departed loved ones were basically illusionists who were out to capitalize on grief. When we look back at the photographs of "spirits" from back then, it's hard to understand how people could have been fooled by these obviously faked photos of paper-cutout ghosts and people hiding beneath sheets. It's easy to chuckle at their gullibility, but it's also extremely sad to think that mourners were genuinely fooled into believing they were viewing photographs of their deceased relatives. My favorite part of the research was learning the tricks the photographers employed long before the age of Photoshop, but at the back of my head, my heart was always hurting for their victims.

(CM) What came first?  The want to tell a ghost story or the want to write a historical novel?

(Cat) That's a hard question to answer. I've been a fan of both ghost tales and historical fiction since childhood. I fell in love with ghost stories around the age of eight, and when I was about nine, I read my first favorite historical novel: Frances Hodgson Burnett's A Little Princess. I'm drawn to reading books that blend history and ghosts, so I suppose it was natural for me to want to write such a novel.

(CM) Mary Shelley Black!  How'd you come up with adding literature and German culture into the story with a simple name?

(Cat) Mary Shelley Black showed up in my head with her name intact. I don't know why, but that's what she insisted on being called, and it's not always easy to argue with her. Before I even sat down to write the novel, I had been studying the violence and prejudice against German-Americans during WWI, and I learned about the frenzied drive to remove German culture and the German language from the United States. I realized a girl who had been named after the author of Frankenstein--a book with a Swiss German title--would have to be careful about her own name if she discussed its origin out loud. I also felt it would be interesting to give her a family of Swiss German origin. As described in the novel, Swiss immigrants like Mary Shelley's family truly did run dairy farms in the western hills of Portland, Oregon, and anyone with a heritage remotely German would have needed to go the extra mile to prove they were "100% American."

I included a few other nods to Frankenstein throughout In the Shadow of Blackbirds. The book is by no means a retelling of the classic horror novel, but Mary Shelley Black's life is definitely intertwined with Shelley's tale of reanimated life and science.

(CM) In all of your research I'm sure you came across a favorite ghost story from WWI, can you tell us about it?

(Cat) Actually, I didn't come across any ghost tales during my WWI research, although the accounts of haunted human beings who experienced the war were far more chilling than any ghost story. I did a quick check of WWI ghost legends after reading your question, and there are indeed several tales of haunted battle sites and WWI cemeteries in France. I've heard firsthand accounts of people feeling a sense of eeriness at Gettysburg here in the U.S., so I suppose the same would be true at other battlefields across the world, especially ones involving a massive loss of lives.

(CM) Out of all of the characters in your book, which one was your favorite to write?

(Cat) Mary Shelley Black, without a doubt. This book would have been extremely difficult and depressing to write if I didn't pick the right narrator, but seeing this dark, horrific world though Mary Shelley's scientific, optimistic, brutally honest eyes transformed the entire story into something almost magical. I have a soft spot for Stephen, of course, and hope he forgives me for what I put him through in this book. I also thoroughly enjoyed writing Jones and Carlos, two side characters who didn't show up in the novel until a later draft. But if I had to pick just one person, I'd say Mary Shelley is definitely my girl. 

(CM) Can you tell us a little bit about your new book?  (You have no idea how excited I am for it!)

(Cat) Thank you for your excitement! That's encouraging to hear as I experience second-book jitters. :) The novel is called The Cure for Dreaming, and it's about a seventeen-year-old girl in 1900 America. Her father is terrified that she's going to turn into a suffragist and a "modern woman," so he hires a talented young hypnotist to remove rebellious, unfeminine thoughts from her head. Naturally, the cure doesn't go quite as planned. The novel will be available from Amulet Books in Fall 2014...and like In the Shadow of Blackbirds, it will contain historical photographs and illustrations.

(CM) Thank you so much for stopping by and helping us celebrate today Cat!

And now, a GIVEAWAY!!!

Seriously, if you haven't read In the Shadow of Blackbirds, you need to go and get your hands on a copy.  Or you can try your luck at winning one here!  That's right, I'm giving away a beautiful hardback copy of In the Shadow of Blackbirds to one of you lucky guys!  I wish I could give you all a copy, but that takes lots of the money...

The giveaway is international, just make sure that The Book Depository ships to you, before you enter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Till next year,

Christianna

*throws confetti* 

[Review: In The Shadow Of Blackbirds by Cat Winters]

"In the Shadow of Blackbirds"
Author: Cat Winters
Pages: 387
Genre: YA, Historical Fiction, Paranormal
Date Published: April 2nd, 2013
Publisher: Amulet Books
Format Read: Finished copy from the library

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Summary:

In 1918, the world seems on the verge of apocalypse. Americans roam the streets in gauze masks to ward off the deadly Spanish influenza, and the government ships young men to the front lines of a brutal war, creating an atmosphere of fear and confusion. Sixteen-year-old Mary Shelley Black watches as desperate mourners flock to séances and spirit photographers for comfort, but she herself has never believed in ghosts. During her bleakest moment, however, she’s forced to rethink her entire way of looking at life and death, for her first love—a boy who died in battle—returns in spirit form. But what does he want from her?

Featuring haunting archival early-twentieth-century photographs, this is a tense, romantic story set in a past that is eerily like our own time.

-Goodreads 

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My Thoughts:

I seriously want to put this book high up on a pedestal with an escalator next to it (because I'm lazy) so I can go up and look at it and read it and pet it!  This book was combination of all the things that I love.  It's drenched in history, dread, death, the paranormal and twists that I wasn't even expecting.  Cat Winters did her homework on the world that she created and all of that hard work shows in the details that she added into the atmospheric prose of In the Shadows of Blackbirds.

The most impressive thing about this book is just how deeply rooted int history it is.  I found out some really interesting and disturbing things while reading this book and to me that adds to the reading experience in so many different ways.  As a native Californian myself I was excited that this was a war story set in San Diego.  This book not only touches on World War 1, but also the Spanish Flu (I don't think I'll ever think of an ambulance the same way again), spiritualism and the fear that all of those things brought on.  Though I know a lot about the war I didn't know a lot about any of the other subjects that were covered in this book.

The book is dark.  The tale is dark and the feeling that it leaves you with are ones that makes you just slightly afraid while you're reading it.  It's so subtle that, whispering so softly in your ear that you almost don't know that the fear is there.  That's how well crafted the atmosphere of this book is.  It teases you with all of the info and forces you to see the things that the characters are feeling and seeing in a way that keeps your mind clouded enough that when things are finally revealed you are surprised.

Mary Shelley Black is a strong protagonist and Winters takes her through some ringers.  Seriously, the things that this girl has to deal with were things that a lot of people dealt with in 1918, but seeing it through Mary Shelley's eyes makes it personal.  I loved her internal dialogue and the words that came out of her mouth.  She was a sharp witted, little thing and her lack of fear and curious mind made her someone that you could connect with on some level, if not all of them.  She feared the things around her and yet pushed through that fear to find the truth!

Mary Shelley and Stephan's relationship is haunting (both literally and figuratively).  It's heartbreaking and interesting to watch their relationship between their old letters and Stephan returning to the living world in his own way.  It'll tug at your heartstrings and make you smile all at the same time, while also shedding a tear.

All of the secondary characters were well used.  Both Embers brothers, Julius and Stephan had their parts to play and in a way your heart broke for both of them.  Aunt Eva was a young girl who wasn't ready to have to step up to the jobs of a man and yet she tried the best she could.  Even the smaller characters served their purposes in helping the mystery unfold.  The men rehabilitating in the Red Cross even had a special place in my heart.  

I think one of the other things about this book that impressed me, is that Winters managed to also give us a coming of age tale wrapped in all the other things that I've mentioned.  People were fearing for their lives and loves on a daily basis and yet they still had to go about their business and even the people of German descent had to hide their heritage.  It's interesting to see Mary Shelley survive and thrive in discovering herself in a world that was trying to hide from death and jail and a slew of other terrible things.

If you are a fan of historical fiction and ghosts and things that go bump in the night, then this is the book for you.  Even if you don't enjoy those things, I highly suggest this book.  It's rich and creepy and so well paced that you will be left satisfied and wanting more when you turn the last page!

Side Note: The book is so beautiful and the pictures add so much to it.  AKA get yourself a print copy if you can!

Rating:

               5 Unicorns = Get your hands on this right now!